1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains generally to finishing technology of metals or other materials, including the manufacture of the machine employing the barrel finishing method and application of that machine for finishing the workpieces.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the conventional barrel finishing machine of the kind disclosed herein, a plurality of individual barrel-shaped containers are used, which are held rotatably between bearings on a turret capable of high-speed rotation so that the workpieces in each barrel can be subjected to the finishing process, such as surface finishing, deburring milling, stirring, mixing, chemical proceesing, etc. For example, it is known that this type of machine provides a high working efficiency, and it is widely used (as disclosed in the U.S. Pat. No. 3,233,372, which corresponds to British Pat. No. 1,047,703).
For the above prior art machine, however, there is a problem particularly when the lids for the individual barrels are to be removed or remounted and the finished workpieces are to be replaced with unfinished workpieces, since those operations must usually occur during the time interval that the machine is inoperational, and require relatively much loss of time. For example, even when the time required by the machine for its finishing is as short as several minutes, replacing the mass often requires several steps since it must be done for all the barrels, sequentially. Particularly when the number of barrels to be mounted on the machine is large, more time is required for the above operation. In either case, the machine must be inoperational until the mass replacement for all barrels is completed. Thus, it is practically impossible to take full advantage of the high working efficiency provided by the machine. This also imposes limitations on the high productivity that could otherwise be achieved. In the description that follows, it should be understood that the term "mass" refers to the mixture including media, or abrasive media, workpieces and compound solution used for the finishing process, unless it is so mentioned specifically.